Meatloaf: Two for One

Warning: This may not be the post for a vegetarian!

There's something about meatloaf and guys.  They just plain like it!  Well, any guy that likes meat anyway.

A couple weeks ago I realized I had meatloaf just waiting for me in my freezer.  I had ground lamb, ground pork, and ground red meat - in this case, my parents farm raised venison.  All of this meat was from a local farmer, or a farmer I knew very well.  So I went about determining what recipe to use for my meatloaf.  I used Alton Brown's Good Eats Meatloaf as my base, but out of that base I actually made two very different meatloaves.  One went in the oven that night for dinner and one went in the freezer for a future week.  I could just as easily taken the second half and made meatballs to freeze for a future week.

While not a big issue, I also wanted to make my meatloaves gluten free, so that meant out with the croutons or bread crumbs.  I used ground oats and that worked well.

Meat Base: For my meat base, I defrosted a pound each of ground lamb, ground pork, and ground venison and mixed it together.  That mix I divided in half.  Isn't half the fun of meatloaf the leftovers?

Meatloaf One
1/2 c. roughly ground oats (I used a clean coffee grinder.)
1/2 teaspoon  ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon thyme
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
2 carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
3 whole cloves of garlic
1/2 green bell pepper
1 portion of ground meat base
1 egg

Glaze: For this one I did use Alton's glaze, with less cumin.
1/2 cup Ketchup
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
Dash Worcestershire sauce
Dash hot sauce
1 Tablespoon honey

Directions:

1.  Combine onion, carrot, garlic, and green pepper in the food processor and pulse until chopped to desired texture. 
2. In large bowl combine, black pepper, cayenne pepper, paprika, thyme, salt, vegetables, roughly ground oats, meat, and 1 egg. 
3. Mix, hands seem to work best here so take of any rings, wash your hands well, and go for it.
4. You could use a meatloaf pan, but I formed my meatloaf into a football like structure and cooked it in a square baking pan.
5. Top with glaze, if desired.
6. I cooked this at 325 for about 1 hour and 20 minutes, but check earlier and take out when it's reached 155 degrees.

Meatloaf two
 1/2 cup roughly ground oats
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1 carrot, peeled and roughly chopped
1/2 cup sundried tomatoes
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
1/2 green bell pepper
2 cloves garlic
1 portion of ground meat base
1 egg

 

Directions:

1.  Combine onion, carrot, sun dried tomatoes, garlic and green pepper in the food processor and pulse until chopped to desired texture. 
2. In large bowl combine, black pepper, thyme, oregano, paprika, salt, vegetables, roughly ground oats, meat, and 1 egg. 
3. Mix, hands seem to work best here so take of any rings, wash your hands well and go for it.
4. You could use a meatloaf pan, but I formed my meatloaf into a football like structure and cooked it in a square baking pan.
5. Top with glaze, if desired.  See glaze tip under hints below.
6. I cooked this at 325 for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, but check earlier and take out when it's reached 155 degrees.

 Hints:

1. You could add more vegetables if needed or change it up, add red peppers instead of green if preferred.  Zucchini would work great.
2. The traditional glaze is a slice of bacon and ketchup.  But pretty much anything will work.  For my second meatloaf I was out of ketchup and I just topped the meatloaf with a slather of spicy mustard.  It worked!
3. Meatloaf leftovers: of course there are always meatloaf sandwiches.  Meatloaf and Swiss cheese Panini's are my favorite, but with the second meatloaf I chopped up the meatloaf fine, mixed in some beef broth, chopped carrots, peas, and corn and topped it with some mashed sweet potatoes.  After baking for a bout 1/2 hour at 350 that was my version of a Shepard's pie.

Sadly, I did not have any good pictures of the completed meatloaves, so following is a so-so picture.  You'll have to trust me, they were both good with lots of nice crispy sides and top!

 Trust me, you will have a happy guy at the table, if you serve him meatloaf.